Spanish GP: Hamilton on pole ahead of Maldonado, Alonso 3rd

Beautiful and exciting qualifying at the Spanish GP: Lewis Hamilton is in pole position, but the big surprise is Pastor Maldonado's second place with Williams. Excellent third place for Fernando Alonso with Ferrari, while there were many excellent eliminations.

Hamilton lapped in 1'21”707, half a tenth faster than the Venezuelan and six tenths better than the Spaniard from Cavallino. Behind him the two Lotus drivers, Romain Grosjean and Kimi Raikkonen, and then Sergio Perez with Sauber and Nico Rosberg with Mercedes; only eighth place for Sebastian Vettel, with his Red Bull ahead of Michael Schumacher in the second Mercedes and Kamui Kobayashi in the other Sauber. For these last three riders there were no useful laps. Big names like Jenson Button, Mark Webber and Felipe Massa, who will start 17th, have been eliminated.

Q1 begins with the drivers waiting five minutes to get on the track: a strong wind is blowing on the track and the temperature is 28°, which rises to 40° on the asphalt. Alonso is among the first to hit the circuit: he uses hard tires and gets the best time ahead of Rosberg and Grosjean. However, Sergio Perez was impressive as he beat the Ferrari driver's time, while Hamilton also took first place two tenths better than the Red. Button is unable to repeat the performance of his teammate due to a large understeer and is 7th, with the Red Bulls still stopped in the pits eight minutes from the end of the first heat. Meanwhile Schumacher takes third place, while Hamilton improves and drops below the 1'23” barrier.

Maldonado mounted the Softs and achieved the best time in his Williams, six tenths better than the McLaren. The Venezuelan's move alarms Alonso, who, like Massa, who is tenth, goes out on the track using the soft tyres. Finally Vettel also begins his fast lap on the Softs: he finishes in second place but the gap to Williams is over two tenths. Grosjean with the Lotus overtakes everyone and is the fastest, 30 thousandths behind Alonso who takes second place. Massa also improved, while Hamilton achieved record partials on the Softs and even finished with a time of 1'22”583. in the end Bruno Senna goes off the track after a spin with the Williams and is eliminated from Q2, like the two Caterhams of Vitaly Petrov and Heikki Kovalainen, the two Marussias of Charles Pic and Timo Glock and the two HRTs of Pedro De La Rosa and Narain Karthikeyan. The latter lapped with a time well over the 1057% required by the regulations and therefore is currently also eliminated from the race, unless the race commissioners decide to readmit him.

Q2 begins with Kobayashi first on track, followed by the big names on used Soft tyres. After the first lap, the fastest is Hamilton who improves his Q1 time by a tenth, followed by Webber and Button. Alonso is currently 7th, while Massa is 12th and at risk of elimination. Raikkonen took to the track for just one attempt directly on new soft tires and finished in second place, four tenths behind Hamilton. Grosjean also sets an excellent time and beats his teammate by two tenths: now Alonso is also at risk of elimination and is forced to return to the asphalt. Massa recovered up to 10th place, while Alonso placed fourth behind Raikkonen. Now it's Vettel who fears elimination but manages to get behind Alonso; the end of Q2 was explosive and sensational, with Pastor Maldonado achieving the best time with 1'22”105, three tenths better than Hamilton. Perez placed fourth behind Grosjean, while Raikkonen fifth preceded Alonso, Rosberg, Vettel, Kobayashi and Michael Schumacher. Surprisingly eliminated were Jenson Button with McLaren and Mark Webber with Red Bull, as well as the two Force Indias of Paul Di Resta and Nico Hulkenberg, the Toro Rossos of Jean-Eric Vergne and Daniel Ricciardo, and Felipe Massa who finished in 17th place .

Q3 begins in Q2, in the sense that upon returning to the pits Kamui Kobayashi stops his Sauber along the circuit due to a fault and therefore will not be able to participate in the final qualifying heat. The ten best, however, are waiting for just one useful lap: Vettel does one lap but returns to the pits, while Hamilton achieves a time of 1'22”560. These are very strange qualifying sessions, with the temperature having dropped and the drivers waiting in a surreal way, almost as if they don't want to wear out a set of tyres. Schumacher also takes a lap and returns to the pits: not so Rosberg, who finishes four and a half tenths behind Hamilton. With three minutes to go Maldonado, Raikkonen and Alonso take to the track, Hamilton also dives into the fray, as does Vettel, the last in line. In the final battle Alonso's Ferrari emerges, taking third place, beaten only by Hamilton and Maldonado. Vettel, given the Englishman's time, decides to return to the pits. In conclusion, very tight, exciting and spectacular qualifying, with the final emotion of Lewis Hamilton who stops along the track and has some problems reaching the pit area.

Lorena Bianchi

Spanish GP Qualifying Results:

Pos Driver Team Time Gap 1. Lewis Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes 1m21.707s 2. Pastor Maldonado Williams-Renault 1m22.285s + 0.578 3. Fernando Alonso Ferrari 1m22.302s + 0.595 4. Romain Grosjean Lotus-Renault 1m22.424s + 0.717 5 Kimi Raikkonen Lotus-Renault 1m22.487s + 0.780 6. Sergio Perez Sauber-Ferrari 1m22.533s + 0.826 7. Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1m23.005s + 1.298 8. Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault No time 9. Michael Schumacher Mercedes No time 10. Kamui Kobayashi Sauber-Ferrari No time 11. Jenson Button McLaren-Mercedes 1m22.944s + 0.839 12. Mark Webber Red Bull-Renault 1m22.977s + 0.872 13. Paul di Resta Force India-Mercedes 1m23.125s + 1.020 14. Nico Hulkenberg Force India-Mercedes 1m23.177s + 1.072 15. Jean-Eric Vergne Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m23.265s + 1.160 16. Daniel Ricciardo Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m23.442s + 1.337 17. Felipe Massa Ferrari 1m23.444s + 1.339 18 Bruno Senna Williams-Renault 1m24.981s + 2.398 19. Vitaly Petrov Caterham-Renault 1m25.277s + 2.694 20. Heikki Kovalainen Caterham-Renault 1m25.507s + 2.924 21. Charles Pic Marussia-Cosworth 1m26.582s + 3.999 22 1. Thyme Glock Marussia-Cosworth 27.032m4.449s + 23 1. Pedro de la Rosa HRT-Cosworth 27.555m4.972s + 24 1. Narain Karthikeyan HRT-Cosworth 31.122m8.539s + XNUMX